


Unshrouded

by j_quadrifrons



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Bathing/Washing, Canon Asexual Character, Do Not Archive (The Magnus Archives), Hair Washing, Kink Meme, M/M, Massage, Multiple Orgasms, Overstimulation, Prostate Massage, Ritual Sex, Shaving, beholding kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-10-15
Packaged: 2020-12-17 00:14:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21045116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/j_quadrifrons/pseuds/j_quadrifrons
Summary: "You don't reallyhaveto," Jon had said when Elias explained to him what the ritual would require. "It's all just–just made up, the Eye doesn't carehowyou do it."Elias had given him the fond, exasperated look of a parent finding their child seriously questioning them for the first time. "'Made up' is a particularly cynical way of putting it, though I suppose not entirely incorrect," he'd conceded. "But the most important decisions were made years ago, and to change the shape of the ritual now would be to ruin it for another two hundred years or more, as you well know. Besides which," Elias had said, fixing Jon with that penetrating gaze that had once been so intimidating, "you did agree to it."





	Unshrouded

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a fill for a kink meme prompt: https://rusty-kink.dreamwidth.org/1380.html?thread=103780#cmt103780

"You don't really _have_ to," Jon had said when Elias explained to him what the ritual would require. "It's all just–just made up, the Eye doesn't care _how_ you do it."  
  
Elias had given him the fond, exasperated look of a parent finding their child seriously questioning them for the first time. "'Made up' is a particularly cynical way of putting it, though I suppose not entirely incorrect," he'd conceded. "But the most important decisions were made years ago, and to change the shape of the ritual now would be to ruin it for another two hundred years or more, as you well know. Besides which," Elias had said, fixing Jon with that penetrating gaze that had once been so intimidating, "you did agree to it."  
  
He had agreed, if not to the specifics then to whatever sacrifices Elias's ritual–not the Watcher's Crown, but some necessary prelude to it–would require, his price for removing the monster he'd left in charge of the Magnus Institute in his absence. By then there had been no doubt that to do so was to play directly into the plan Elias had had all along, but there had been no other options, or none that Jon was willing to consider. Which is why he's standing here now, barefoot and shivering in the perfectly still, warm air of the tunnels of old Millbank Prison, as Elias unbuttons his shirt with careful deliberation.   
  
There's a room down here with a stone tub, full to the brim with clear water that laps at its rim in spite of the fact that there's nothing to disturb it. It does answer a few questions about how Leitner lived down here for so long, though it raises a great many more. Jon has decided to believe, absent any other evidence, that Elias filled the tub himself by carrying buckets of water down the stairs and through the long, winding passages. He doesn't like the implications of the alternatives. At least the water is clear and fresh, not dark and brackish like that which appears in too many statements.  
  
Elias brushes the shirt off his shoulders, thumbs tracing the lines of Jon's collarbones, and he represses a shiver. He wants to close his eyes to escape Elias's watchful gaze and at the same time he doesn't with a ferocity that scares him. Elias breaks his gaze to direct that intensity toward newly bared skin. His hands trail down Jon's arms, following the shirt that drops heedless to the floor, until he has one hand wrapped around the scar Michael left in his wrist and the other holding fingers Jude had burned.   
  
Then he lets go, before Jon can protest the untoward intimacy of holding hands under these circumstances, and his hands go instead to Jon's waist, fingers pressing in on the hollow space where he's missing ribs and following a pattern of worm scars until they land on the fastening of Jon's trousers.   
  
Jon's breath catches in his throat, and Elias looks up at him expectantly, but he can't think of anything to say, and after a long moment Elias undoes the button, and then the zip, still meeting Jon's eyes, steady and unblinking. Jon licks his lips and Elias smirks a little as his hands slide down Jon's hips, the contact so fleeting it's only his knowledge of Elias that convinces him it's really there, as he removes first Jon's trousers and then his underwear, letting them pool at Jon's feet.   
  
His cock is starting to fill, he's embarrassed to find, the combination of undivided attention and impossibly gentle touches bringing him into his body in a way he's not accustomed to. To his surprise Elias takes no notice, merely offering him a hand to climb into the bath. He'd love to avoid taking it, but there's no dignified way to get into the thing otherwise, and even with help there's a not insubstantial splash. The water is blood-warm, the tub slanted so that it leaves him reclining comfortably and terrible vulnerable. When he lays his head back on the stone edge Elias's hand is there at the back of his neck to ease him down, then sliding down his shoulder, thumb rubbing firm into the taut muscle there. Then he takes up a pitcher from the floor and begins to wash Jon's hair.  
  
He must have been a child the last time someone did this for him. It's almost unbearably intimate. Elias's fingers rub slow circles into his scalp, work out the worst of the persistent tangles in hair that's grown too long since the last time he'd even thought about cutting it. Jon feels a little guilty about that, he used to be so fastidious about his personal appearance, but it's subsumed under waves of contentment and pure sensory bliss.  
  
Jon sucks in a breath when the cold edge of the blade touches his throat, but he's too relaxed to be truly afraid before Elias draws it up to the line of his jaw, beginning to scrape away the two-days' growth of stubble Jon couldn't be bothered to do anything about. Of course he uses a straight razor. _Pretentious_, Jon thinks. A moment later he thinks, _Efficient_, and the smug amusement in it is not his own. Elias strokes the newly-smooth skin lightly with his fingertips and moves to the other side.   
  
When he's finished Elias offers Jon his hand again to help him out. He's reluctant to take it, not just because the air is much colder than the soothing warmth of the bath. Between the growing feeling of being watched and Elias's careful, ceaseless touches to some of his most vulnerable places he's fully aroused, and Elias's gentle amusement at his reluctance is not encouraging in the slightest. He takes Elias's hand in the end anyway, as he always does.   
  
Elias doesn't give him the towel, of course, but pats him dry with the same gentle thoroughness, paying no more attention to–to any part of him more than another. And yet his hands trail along Jon's skin in the wake of it and he can't possibly be unaware of what he's doing. There's a whole new tension seeping into his muscles now, a shiver that runs behind Elias's touch and leaves Jon feeling hot and overwhelmed in its wake. He fights to keep his breathing steady, as if there's anything he can do to keep Elias from knowing exactly what he's feeling.  
  
"What, not even a robe?" Jon asks, irritable, when Elias lays a hand on his bare waist to usher him toward the inner door–one he hadn't noticed before, although it blends so seamlessly with the brickwork that he suspects the reason is entirely mundane for once.   
  
"I don't really think that will be necessary," Elias murmurs, and Jon can hear the smile on his lips.

There's an altar in the inner chamber, of course, draped in white cloth, and precious little else. The electric lights in the walls look as though they must still be original to the late nineteenth century. There are no shadows here, nowhere to hide; the light is almost clinical in its intensity. Jon thinks he's beginning to understand how this ritual will feed Beholding after all.  
  
Elias guides him to sit on the edge of the altar (cushioned, Jon is relieved to find, under all that crisp soft linen) and then, with the first sign that any of this has affected him in the slightest, leans forward to claim Jon's mouth in a kiss as he presses his shoulders gently down. He kisses as thoroughly as he's done everything else, but there's heat in it now, a neediness to the way he licks across Jon's teeth and steals his breath. When he pulls away his eyes are bright and his lips swollen and pink, and Jon is lying on his back on the altar, gasping and feeling terribly exposed.  
  
With firm, steady hands he encourages Jon to turn over and lie on his stomach. Jon hisses in a sharp breath when he settles down the weight of his hips, pressing his hard cock into soft linen and the thin mattress laid across the top of the altar. Elias's hands still at the sound, and then he pulls away and Jon almost feels bereft. Then something warm and liquid spills down his spine and pools at the small of his back, and Elias's hands are back, smoothing it across Jon's marked and scarred skin.  
  
"If that's blood," he mutters, surly, and Elias actually laughs. He brings a slick hand up to where Jon can see–just oil, with a faint resinous scent that reminds him of some of the more solemn church services of his use. Appropriate, perhaps, for a ritual in service of a god, even one so terrible as the Eye.  
  
What Elias is doing with his hands seems vastly less appropriate. He digs his thumbs into the muscle on either side of Jon's spine, dragging all the way down from the nape of his neck to the swell of his arse, loosening tensions he didn't know he had. He presses the heels of his hands into Jon's shoulders until the knots there give way and Jon gasps with the sudden absence of pain. He kneads the muscles of Jon's arse, the backs of his thighs, loosening tendons and leaving Jon boneless and content. Every time Elias turns away, for more oil or to find a better position, he leaves one firm hand on the small of Jon's back, and it's all Jon can do not to let it press him down further and rock into the soft sheets beneath him until he comes.   
  
Elias turns him over again, doing more of the work now that Jon is half gone on the overwhelming feeling of being touched so thoroughly. He has a brief flash of embarrassment about his erection, but Elias has one hand firm on his shoulder and the other curled around his hip, and the possessive way his thumb strokes the soft hollow inside the crest of the bone settles him again. He still feels terribly exposed, but it feels _right_. When that realization strikes, Elias hums in satisfaction and resumes his massage.   
  
It's as he takes Jon's arm in his hands, pressing into the tense muscle of his forearm, that he's reminded suddenly of cold plastic fingers and the smell of cheap lotion. It's amazing it hadn't happened before, really–but before he can grow tense and nervous Elias has moved on, sliding both hands under Jon's back and letting his weight do the work of stretching out his neck, and the feeling is gone. It threatens again when Elias's touch grows gentler, down Jon's ribcage to the soft, hollow space beneath it, and he finds his voice to stammer out, "I–I don't–"  
  
"Of course not," Elias says, and there's something in his voice that Jon fears is disappointment until he looks into his eyes and sees a flash of barely restrained anger. _Oh_, Jon thinks, overwhelmed just as suddenly by this unexpected display of emotion. He doesn't want to think too hard about the way his stomach turns over in response, and he doesn't have to, because Elias is hooking one hand under his knee, guiding it up and out, putting his leg exactly where he wants it before sliding down his inner thigh.  
  
Jon arches silently into the touch when Elias finally wraps a hand around his cock, his lungs seized with too much tension to even cry out. Elias's fingers are a little cold and it feels like a balm on his overheated skin, the contrast almost more powerful than the drag of friction as Elias strokes him firmly, short, fast strokes that bring him back to full hardness in seconds. He can't look away from the hungry way Elias is watching his body, the kind of look that usually makes him want to squirm away but now he drops his head back and relishes the chance, for once, to watch Elias so intent he doesn't turn his head to meet Jon's gaze.  
  
He doesn't quite manage to stifle the small whine that rises from his throat when Elias lets go, petting down his flank before reaching for a plastic tube, incongruously modern in this setting. It's scentless, at least, which makes it easier to stay relaxed as Elias strokes the furled muscle of his entrance, hot and slick and much, much better than he thought this would be. Jon isn't really aware that he's biting his lip until Elias looks up to meet his eyes at last, and with a small smile leans in for another kiss.   
  
His tongue slips into Jon's mouth at the same time that his finger slips into Jon's body, and the sound Jon makes in response would be humiliating if he couldn't feel it being soaked up by the Eye, along with every catch in his breath and quiver of his muscles. Elias strokes gently until he relaxes again, and then he adds two more fingers and the stretch is perfect, the hint of pain the perfect counterpoint to his hazy pleasure.   
  
And then Elias crooks his fingers and presses firmly against his prostate and Jon _keens_, all other thoughts driven away by a short, sharp burst of ecstasy. It's too much, he's sure his body will shake apart if Elias doesn't stop, doesn't _move_, but Elias stays just there, pressing hard with the tiniest of movements, and the pressure builds and builds until it crests in a sudden wave that leaves Jon clutching at the sheet and sobbing–something, he doesn't know what. A prayer, a plea, Elias's name, all three at once? Whatever it was Elias is very pleased; he kisses Jon as soon as he stops gasping for breath. He does not remove his fingers.   
  
The wave is slower the second time, coming on in fits and starts; Jon feels as though his nervous system has short-circuited and isn't accepting input properly yet. Elias kisses him through it, a distraction he's sure he ought to loathe, but his mouth is warm and sweet and welcoming, and Jon abandoned the last of his defenses some time ago. When Elias has wrung a weak second orgasm from him, he releases Jon's lips, dropping small kisses on the corner of his mouth before he pulls away entirely. "That was lovely," he murmurs, and the praise given in his rich, dark voice goes directly to Jon's gut and twists inside him. "You're doing beautifully, Jon. Can you give me one more?" His pupils are blown wide when he meets Jon's eyes, greedy and demanding.   
  
Jon shakes his head weakly; his body was never meant for this, surely, and there's no way he can bear any more. "I can't," he says, and it sounds a little like regret.  
  
"You can," Elias says with confidence, and he presses his fingers deeper while he wraps his other hand around Jon's aching cock.  
  
There's no telling how long it goes on; in the end it isn't one more, but two, leaving Jon shaking and weeping as Elias soothes and praises him and kisses the tears from Jon's cheeks. Jon is barely aware of Elias wrapping him up in the sheet and carrying him down another corridor and into another of those small rooms, this one furnished with an actual bed, much too large and luxurious for its surroundings. Elias deposits Jon in the middle of it, sliding carefully in next to him and wrapping him in his arms. "My beautiful Archivist," he says quietly, awestruck, and Jon falls asleep there, his face tucked into Elias's shoulder, safe and seen and known.

**Author's Note:**

> Please come yell about TMA with me, I have too many feelings  
[@j_quadrifrons](https://twitter.com/j_quadrifrons), [backofthebookshelf](https://backofthebookshelf.tumblr.com)


End file.
